


In the Arms of the Angels

by cozycatastrophe



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Spoilers, The Angels Take Manhattan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-30
Updated: 2012-09-30
Packaged: 2017-11-15 07:51:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,277
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/524917
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cozycatastrophe/pseuds/cozycatastrophe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Doctor and River visit Brian Williams after Manhattan.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In the Arms of the Angels

**Author's Note:**

> Just a quick blurb. Had the idea from a friend and had to get it out. Not sure if I like the final ending... but there it is. Definite spoilers from the 9/29/12 episode of Doctor Who.

He didn’t want to be here.

He had hurtled the TARDIS through light years of stars and galaxies to avoid coming here. After reading Amy’s epilogue, he had thrown himself into the universe. There had been some screaming, some crying, and some saving of worlds with an attempt to forget his best friends. 

He had tried to do what he did with everyone.

He had tried to run.

But when you ran, you had to stop sometime. And when he did, River was there to remind him that he had to go back. He had to return to the one constant being. The one he knew would be waiting just like the Centurion had waited.

Just like the Girl who had waited.

The Doctor had stared at one of the many displays settled on the TARDIS console, stared through the camera that could see outside of the blue box. He saw the familiar front door, painted a familiar blue (the irony had never escaped him, of course) and saw a now familiar figure puttering around inside of the familiar home, watering plants in the familiar windows.

Nothing had ever been familiar before, not before he had met the Ponds.

“Come on, sweetie…” River crooned softly, gently placing a few fingers around his wrist and tugging him from the warm console. He gritted his teeth and flicked a few levers and pushed a few buttons, his free fingers flying across each mechanism. But movements that should have started the whirring engine merely produced silence. “See? Even she knows you need to do this…”

The Doctor groaned, looking at the glass bauble that was supposed to be bouncing up and down inside the TARDIS engine right now.

“Bloody women always thinking they know best…” He grumbled, staring through the glass center of the console straight to the other side of the bigger-on-the-inside box-that-wasn’t-all-that-boxy-on-the-inside. He felt another small tug at his wrist. It felt odd, because it was usually the other way around. Normally, he was grabbing their wrists, their hands, and towing them to the Next Big Adventure.

He never thought he’d need someone to drag him anywhere.

But this… this was different. He never really had companions that had someone waiting for them back home. 

Not like this anyway. Somehow even the loved ones who had been left behind managed to incorporate themselves into the story at some point. Not this time.

He had never come home without one of his traveling companions.

“We have to go, love. C’mon.”

The Doctor scowled, first the console once more and then at the blue door on the screen. It sat there, staring at him, daring at him to leave his comfortable blue box and face reality.

Reality sucked.

He was going to have to tell one of the most brilliant men ever that he couldn’t keep the promise he had made. He hadn’t lied when he had said he had lost people. Some had gotten left behind. Some had left. Some had forgotten him. 

What did this fall under?

He shook his head and attempted to yank his hand back, but the grip merely tightened.

“I should have never healed that wrist of yours,” He mumbled sourly, not meaning a word of it. 

“No, you shouldn’t have. But not for that reason. You know we have to go out there. C’mon. The sooner we do it…” River trailed off and gave his arm another jerk, this one more forceful and it finally pulled him away from the console and starting down the ramp towards the door. But they stopped there, sunlight streaming in through the windows above them. River looked at her husband and smiled softly, sadly. “Ready?”

He looked at her, and then at the door ahead of him, the door that was always supposed to be pulled and was always pushed open from the outside. The doors that the Ponds would never run through again. He wanted so desperately to wrench his arm away from River and sprint into the bowels of the TARDIS, never to emerge again.

Instead, he licked his lips, ran a hand through his floppy hair, and nodded, not waiting for her to open the door for him. If he waited, he might follow through on that running away plan.

Crossing the street wasn’t difficult. He had parked the TARDIS in the playground, as per usual. Physically crossing wasn’t hard. But it was the longest street crossing in the history of ever.

Except maybe Abbey Road. But that was a whole different story with the Beatles.

Luckily, River was more than content on using his arm as more of a leash than an appendage and continued to keep a strong grip as the neared the blue door. The closer and closer they got, the faster and faster his hearts drummed in his chest.

“River… I can’t. This…”

“This is right, my love. He needs to know.” It was all so matter of fact, although he could hear the catch in River’s throat, the thick sorrow in her voice. The Doctor nodded and came to a stop in front of the door. He adjusted his tie with his free hand before moving it to knock three times (not four, never four).

Footsteps came muffled through the door, and he heard grumbling as a figure wrestled with the chain lock. It was enough of a hesitation that he knew he could get away from the door with only some questioning looks. But River’s grip tightened a bit more, anchoring him to the stoop. And then the door opened and the Doctor came face to face with the last person he wanted to see in the universe. Bring on Daleks, bring on the Master, and bring on the Devil himself, all at once.

Instead, he got Brian Williams.

The middle-aged man looked no worse for wear, a watering can in his hand and pleased look on his face.

“Hello, grandfather,” River greeted, always the first to break the silence. Brian looked to her and his pleased look turned blank, as if he knew who she was supposed to be, but couldn’t quite…

And then recognition filtered through the confusion. The Doctor wasn’t quite sure how Brian knew her. Surely after his adventures with dinosaurs and Egyptian queens, the Ponds had told Brian all about his grown up granddaughter and all of the adventures. Maybe possibly found a picture or two to show him. It had to be, as the man let out a cry and the two embraced as if they had merely spent a few weeks apart instead of never ever meeting.

And River’s touch left his wrist. He suddenly felt naked and weightless, like gravity had stopped working and he was going to float away as he watched them hug.

But then soon enough it was over and the attention was on him once more. River had pulled away, and the Doctor caught Brian glancing over his shoulder and into the street, as if Amy and Rory were going to come bouncing out of the TARDIS at any moment. But after a few silent seconds, he looked back at the Doctor, into his eyes and swallowed.

“I…” The Doctor started, and suddenly all of the sadness and anger that had consumed him right after leaving Manhattan came bubbling back up and forced him to stumble over whatever he thought he could say to Brian Williams. 

But Brian merely nodded, tears pooling in the corner of his eyes as he made the connection.

“Come in. I’ll make tea.” He stepped further into the house and swept an arm out, welcoming his granddaughter and her husband inside.


End file.
